# No, the Left is not anti-Semitic (Good grief!) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 3, 2015, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847 "2015-08-03T03:16:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 29
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/561 "2015-08-19T05:35:46Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Nah, the BDS movement and the European leftists are not anti-Semitic, are they: > > [Reggae Singer Matisyahu Disinvited From Music Fest for Not Endorsing Palestinian State - Jewish World - Haaretz.com](http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/1.671389) > > The formerly hasidic star was scheduled to perform on August 22 at the Rototom Sunsplash Reggae Festival in eastern Spain. But he had his show cancelled after he refused to release a public statement backing a Palestinian state, according to the Times of Israel. > > **Matisyahu is not Israeli.** But the Times of Israel reported that the festival was pressured by activists from the BDS movement, which aims to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel, and that other musicians threatened to cancel their performances unless Matisyahu made the declaration. Thank you for the example. > [@dropzone](#): > > Just a reminder that we US leftists don’t like being tarred with the same brush you use on the Yurpeens. Our cultures have diverged enough that we’re nearly different _species_, FFS. Hey now, I’m not signing onto that. I’m descended from Europeans, and I hold out hope that one day my European-American neighbors will learn how to become less fanatically Randian. Or, you know, die off. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/562 "2015-08-19T05:45:02Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > There are Ethiopian Jews, Yemeni Jews, Georgian Jews, “Spanish” (Sephardic) Jews, Russian Jews, Mesopotamian Jews. Which of those came from Israel? All of them, originally. > [@](#): > > Do you really want to argue that the Palestinians are illegitimate because their ancestors came from different places? And supposedly in the last hundred years? Really? Yes. Since that is exactly the reasoning that the anti-Semites use against Israel’s legitimacy, why is it not ok to turn it around and use it against the so-called “Palestinians”? ---
**Author:** ![camille](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/22d042/32.png) [@camille](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/camille)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/563 "2015-08-19T05:45:20Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Are you going to pretend next that the Israelis have been there, speaking Hebrew, in the land of Canaan, all along? Or are you going to pretend that no one was living in the territory when the Zionists showed up? This part is not pretense. There _was_ always a Jewish presence there, even after the majority dispersed into the diaspora. That is not in dispute. Of course, there were others there as well, with periodic migrations in and out. As I said earlier, many of today’s Palestinians are quite probably descendants of some of those Jews who remained behind, and were forced to convert and were “Arabized”. Genetic studies show that the Jews in the diaspora did originate there as well. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/564 "2015-08-19T05:46:48Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Or “says WHO?” if we want to get the UN involved. But **andros** is right; the surname hijack is the most pathetic one in this thoroughly-hijacked thread. Well, that Hamas guy insisting that his people are so Arab, so many Egyptians and Arabians, does make his side look like bloody colonists. It really doesn’t help his faction in my eyes. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/565 "2015-08-19T05:56:04Z")
Yeah, I think it’s fair to surmise that “Palestinians” descend from a mix of old Samaritans, Idumeans, various Christians, and Jews of the region, with some later migrants in as well. But if “later” is “400 years ago,” I’m not sure what to do about that. The types like Hamas guy arguing for a particular version of the supremacy of Arabic culture throughout the region are obnoxious. I would happily deport him back to somewhere his ancestors supposedly came from. But an Arabized and Muslim descendant of Samaritans? Eh, not so much, unless _he_ starts calling for the whole territory to be put under someone like the Saudis or Daesh. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/566 "2015-08-19T06:06:32Z")
I read a [Vox](http://www.vox.com/2015/8/18/9173239/matisyahu-bds) piece on this Matisyahu kerfluffle, and I think I see what Terr means. There may be some racist anti-Jewish movements trying to co-opt more leftist avenues of politics. Hmmm. ---
**Author:** ![camille](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/22d042/32.png) [@camille](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/camille)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/567 "2015-08-19T06:32:53Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Nah, the BDS movement and the European leftists are not anti-Semitic, are they: > > [http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/1.671389](http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-news/1.671389) > > The formerly hasidic star was scheduled to perform on August 22 at the Rototom Sunsplash Reggae Festival in eastern Spain. But he had his show cancelled after he refused to release a public statement backing a Palestinian state, according to the Times of Israel. > > **Matisyahu is not Israeli.** But the Times of Israel reported that the festival was pressured by activists from the BDS movement, which aims to boycott, divest from and sanction Israel, and that other musicians threatened to cancel their performances unless Matisyahu made the declaration. I meant to reply to this earlier. Yes, this is definitely antisemitism, and should be called out as such. If you go by twitter and progressive blogs, it\* is \*being called out by many on the left. This is the dilemma of openly criticizing Israeli policies; it will always draw in the antisemites, and eventually they overshadow any valid or rational protest. This is the reason I usually avoid saying anything at all on this subject, along with many other leftist Jews. But it also really rankles when I see or hear examples of blatant anti-Palestinian rhetoric that goes far beyond being simply pro-Israel, and sometimes I have to speak up to that as well. Those who indulge in it are also feeding the antisemites. It’s really not helpful to anyone. BTW, here is an example of horrific antisemitism in the US, 100 years ago this week, that has been mostly forgotten: [**Lynched at Midnight: How anti-Semitism Doomed Leo Frank, Even if the Facts Didn’t**](http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.671478) Even the prosecutor didn’t think Leo Frank had killed 13-year old Mary Phagan, but the ‘Jewish industrialist’ couldn’t get a fair trial in Georgia 100 years ago. [**A Distant Mirror: The Leo Frank Lynching**](http://www.newrepublic.com/article/122542/distant-mirror-leo-frank-lynching?utm_content=bufferbb600&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer) On August 17, 1915, exactly a century ago, Leo Frank, an Ivy League–educated Jewish industrialist, was lynched in the Atlanta suburb of Marietta. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 7:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/568 "2015-08-19T07:43:03Z")
Aye, anti-Semitism, among the left, was certainly an ugly issue in past times. G.K. Chesterton expresses anti-Semitic thoughts in much of his writing, and Robert W. Chambers, author of (rather delightful) romances involving the New York upper crust, also succumbed to anti-Semitism in certain of his stories. (I’m not sure, to be honest, if Chesterton and Chambers count as “left” by the standards of their times. By today’s standards, they’re quite comfortably centrist-liberal.) H.P. Lovecraft wrote some ugly things in the anti-Semitic vein, but he would be much harder to call a leftist. Pretty reactionary, alas. ---
**Author:** ![Plumpudding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Plumpudding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plumpudding)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/569 "2015-08-19T14:43:14Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > I would like an apology, but I don’t expect one. All I really ask is that the lion’s share of American Progressives not be lumped in with those psychos in France. They be crazy. I find it funny you object to being lumped in with us “crazy european lefties”, while at the same time lumping all european lefties in one anti-semitic bigot-boat. I don’t like me and mine being lumped in with “those psychos in France” for boycotting Israeli fruit. On Israel/Palestine: It is a highly loaded and highly confusing conflict. I’m against Israeli policies and isolated incidents of brutality, not ethnicity or religion. I not support Hamas or bombing of Israel. I do hold Israel to a higher standard than Palestine as Israel is a highly developed nation with full support of one of the most powerful nations in the world. They could and should do a lot more to try to make their region more stable. IMO. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2015, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/570 "2015-08-19T23:19:33Z")
> [@Plumpudding](#): > > I find it funny you object to being lumped in with us “crazy european lefties”, while at the same time lumping all european lefties in one anti-semitic bigot-boat. I don’t like me and mine being lumped in with “those psychos in France” for boycotting Israeli fruit. You noticed that, eh? You are the first one to point it out. Next you’ll point to how I claim to be a splitter, not a lumper. I’m just a bundle of contradictions. Anyway, since when is the UK admitting it’s a part of Europe? 😉 > [@foolsguinea](#): > > Hey now, I’m not signing onto that. I’m descended from Europeans, and I hold out hope that one day my European-American neighbors will learn how to become less fanatically Randian. Or, you know, die off. The Brits and us did try that, back in '39-'45, but Hitler rolled over before we could nuke the whole continent. But we have more and better nukes now. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2015, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/571 "2015-08-21T01:46:38Z")
To repeat something I said in another thread, I don’t believe most conservative politicians or pundits care one whit about Israel. All they care about is the belief that keeping them in existence means Jesus will come back (which makes no sense — why would a true believer have to WORK to make a PROPHECY come true?). If it weren’t for that, I honestly don’t think the vast majority of them would give a damn. They certainly wouldn’t go crazy accusing anyone who even mildly questions Israel’s actions anti-Semitic. ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2015, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/572 "2015-08-21T03:03:24Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > To repeat something I said in another thread, I don’t believe most conservative politicians or pundits care one whit about Israel. All they care about is the belief that keeping them in existence means Jesus will come back (which makes no sense — why would a true believer have to WORK to make a PROPHECY come true?). If it weren’t for that, I honestly don’t think the vast majority of them would give a damn. They certainly wouldn’t go crazy accusing anyone who even mildly questions Israel’s actions anti-Semitic. That is a mostly false analysis. Evangelicals only might up a small percentage of the right-wing. Granted, the motives for right-wing support are complicated but most of it depends on the fact that Israel is the only social democracy in the region and they are (usually) U.S. allies in a region that is mostly hostile to U.S. interests. I am not a true right-winger myself but I do know plenty of them personally and their motivation to support Israel can mostly be summed up as Patriotism even if they aren’t Jewish themselves. We can go into all kinds of sub-arguments about why that may be but it isn’t simply because a bunch evangelicals believe Christ is coming back within a few years (although that is admittedly a part of it for some). The Right can be very pragmatic. That is the reason that Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Kuwait are also semi-allies. It is mostly about strategic alliances and shared interests no matter who you are. Israel is a little more philosophical than that. It was a nation-state specifically set up to protect the Jews from future versions of prior horrors. The countries like France that set up the whole deal mostly abandoned them and the U.S. was the only big kid on the block left to truly protect them in the event that they couldn’t protect themselves. The Right has no bias in favor of current underdogs. Claiming victim-hood based on deals that were already signed decades ago doesn’t get you anywhere in the Right Wing mindset. The philosophy is more about meeting promises and fulfilling the stated goal so the Palestinians can eat sand and the Israelis get to keep the land that was already promised to them. The End. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2015, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847/573 "2015-08-21T03:10:01Z")
Hm, perhaps I did go a bit too far in that direction. However, I still feel that in regards to the topic of this thread — the rabid accusations of anyone who DARES to question ANYTHING Israel does as anti-Semitic — it does go further than “mere” realpolitik and strategic implications, and that was the most likely thing that came to my mind. _shrug_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-the-left-is-not-anti-semitic-good-grief/726847.md?page=28)